


Atlas Hands

by ursa



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: A dog dies, Blood, Captain America: The First Avenger, Gen, Graphic Description, Graphic description of TBI, Harm to Animals, Hurt No Comfort, I Am Sorry, Major Character Injury, Trauma, a lot of blood, animal cruelty, basically bucky right after the fall, bucky suffering, but bucky lives!, catfa compliant, concussion, heed the tags, seriously all the hurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-29
Updated: 2020-02-29
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:33:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22957216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ursa/pseuds/ursa
Summary: In 1944, Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes was presumed to have died in a mission to sieze Arnim Zola.These were the moments after the fall.
Relationships: James “Bucky” Barnes & Steve Rogers
Kudos: 11





	Atlas Hands

  
He remembers: the whiteness was disorientating. 

His body's anticipation at the fall's end warring with the sheer dread of meeting the ground. He was thinking, _no_ , he was thinking, _this is going to be painful._

They say when you're about to die, your entire life flashes before your eyes. He knows better - all that flashed before him was the terrible whiteness of the alpine winter.

-

The shock of hitting the ground left him reeling at first, still in the midst of the overwhelming terror of the plunge, the succeeding events impossible to sort in his shell-shocked brain. 

Then there is pain. 

He doesn't understand how, mind still coming to grips to what happened to his battered body but he could feel it: in his spine, his elbows, his heels, the back of his head. He knows if he raised his head to look, there would be blood. But he couldn't, not when he could barely connect the dots from the moment the train exploded, reaching for Steve's outstretched hand, and the unbearable lightness his hands felt when the railing finally snapped.

He couldn’t feel his hands.

-

His breaths were coming in short and slow, the pain in his left side subsiding into the sort of numbness he hasn't felt since Steve dragged him off that table in Azzano. 

It is cold. 

It could’ve been minutes, it could’ve been hours. He doesn’t know. Not when the pain coursed through his body and every movement he tries only debilitates him further. His eyes are half closed and crusted with frozen tears and by the time his body settles into the packed snow, he barely feels the wetness on his back.

He is going to die here, slowly, an imprisoned observant in his expiring body. The thought makes something inside him rage. It’s small kindling but the embers are there. He exhales sharply, teeth gritted and bloody, willing his heart to beat faster just to have another chance at this.

He felt this helplessness before and it consumed him. Steve is alive, Steve hung on. They’ll be looking. He can’t give up, _not now._

He exhales again, working himself up and hyperventilating. His entire body screams.

-

It takes ages for the pain to be bearable enough to sit up. His left side feels crushed. He doesn’t want to look. He’s bitten some of his tongue off and the free-flowing blood in his mouth is hot enough to remind himself he’s alive. He can’t scream and he can’t stop himself from whimpering when he moves his right leg towards himself. 

He’s entire body’s bent forward, right arm braced against his torso, right hand lightly gripping his left hip. He chokes a bit, clearing his throat and spitting a bloody wad on the white earth, staining it. His breathing is staggered, like his lungs aren’t working properly. He bites off a humorless chuckle, _they probably aren’t._

His left leg is still outstretched in front of him and it takes a few seconds for him to place the feeling on his waist, down to his left thigh. He tries to wiggle the toes inside his left boot and a lancing pain zips through him. He chokes on a whimper.

The pain is white hot in his left heel, tendons in his ankle stretched taut and his left calf cramping. The leg is usable, he thinks. Usable at a cost- he probably shouldn’t walk with it.

He catalogues each painful part of his body, trying his damndest not to succumb to the fear trailing after every thought. He thinks instead of how to best move his body so his mind doesn’t blank out every time the pain spikes. 

He’s trembling from his lips to his knees and by the time he gets himself genuflecting in the snow, eyes seeing double, the red ice is stark in his peripheral vision.

Swallowing, he pushes himself up.

-

The first stumble causes a spike of pain that nearly knocks him out. He can feel his nose running, doesn’t know if he’s crying or if it’s the concussion. He landed on his left knee, ice crunching, and the pain is so overwhelming he cried out.

He doesn’t know if he’s alone wherever he is and the hopelessness surges. He sobs, can’t help it, crouching forward, forehead against the frozen ground. He’s trying so hard not to think of anything else but getting somewhere familiar, the rendezvous point, maps jumbled in his mind’s eye. He’s trying but it hurts so much.

He gives himself a minute. Running through an inexpert self-diagnosis to drive away the thoughts. His right arm is still braced over himself, shoulders hiked to his ears. A moment and the nipping cold makes him cognizant again.

He breathes shallowly, muttering a countdown to reorient himself. He leans hard on his right knee to raise his left leg up to stand. It feels like his body is creaking when he does. When his left foot is firm on the ground, he heaves himself up again, exhaling a hiss all the while.

His next inhale is frigid, making his throat constrict. He coughs lightly, in pain but upright. He walks on.

-

There’s pink fluid coming out of his ears. He’s braced against a man-sized boulder, panting after his second stumble. He knows the back of his head is bloody. He remembers the red snow when he first stood up. He’s biting his lip trying not to think about the impossibility of what he’s doing, how he can still walk after that sheer drop.

He felt his body break was the thing. He’s set these thoughts aside after Azzano. He has not thought of them then, just withdrew quietly when alone and spoke and acted like he always did when not. Mission after mission, he got by not thinking of what happened to him on that table. He refused to, he refuses now. But his right hand came away wet and pink when he swiped at his ear and he couldn't help but think.

_Why the hell is he still alive?_

Everything's a mess in his head. He wants to cry. He wants to feel better, he does not like this pain. Tears are pricking at his eyes and his bent head’s causing his nose to leak again.

The droplets on the snow are pink. He heaves a breath and his left side spikes in pain. 

He closes his eyes and thinks of Steve. He thinks of the rendezvous point they set up, he racks his broken brain for his Captain’s instructions, he bites his lip bloody trying to get past the pain blinding him from the memory of the terrain’s map. He can’t even remember. 

_Why the hell is he still trying?_

He chokes and he feels bile rising at the back of his throat. He’s going to be sick but he forces the nausea down. He doesn’t know where he is and he needs that energy in his gut.

His body shivers violently, disturbing his precarious position on the boulder. He almost falls but reflex had his left hand shooting out. He cries out at the movement, his entire left side spasming in cutting pain. 

His left hand is twitching- he can see it. He can see it but the feeling is not at all there and it’s scaring him. Slowly, he tries to lower his left arm but it’s stiff and jerky. Inside the peacoat’s sleeve, the cloth stings against his skin, a thousand needles pressing into the muscle and he can’t categorize it as pain when he actually cannot feel the limb. 

It’s his left shoulder that’s screaming at him. His left ribs. His cramped waist and his trembling left thigh. The unwanted sensations keep running up and down his body and it’s overwhelming, his whines coming out unbidden behind tight lips. 

He breathes loudly through it, his right hand forcing his left arm down and to his side. He tucks his chin into his neck, the shaking fingers of his right hand fumbling to pop his collar up.

The wind starts to howl. 

-

He thinks he manages a few more yards before he hears it. Muffled against the wild gusting, it’s soft but he hears it. Crunching footsteps, right at the corner of the ravine. His already stiff body tenses further, not sure if the men are hostile or not. 

The pain in his head had been a persistent block to thinking clearly but vaguely he knows he’s deep in enemy territory.

He doesn’t have any significant weapons on him, only leftover munitions in his coat’s inside pockets and a couple of small knives in his boots. He cannot fight melee with his injuries. If they are who he thinks they are, surrender might not be an option. He might as well die. 

He will not go back to that table. 

-

In one moment and the next, he suddenly remembers the mangy stray dog that prowled three blocks from their apartment. He remembers how the dog yelped at the kids who poked sticks at it, barking in futility as the pokes turned to swats. 

He remembers Steve, tensing at his side, shoulders squared up as he pivots towards the noisy alley, dead set on stopping the cruelty. 

He remembers the dog as he stumbles backwards just when the group rounds the corner, seeing him hunched to himself in his damnable blue coat. He remembers the blood on its fur as the group advances towards him. 

He remembers one of the kids pointing the stick at Steve when he told them to stop after the dog stopped moving just as one of the men lifts his gun to aim at him. 

He remembers Steve grabbing the stick and shouting at the kids just as he lets out a wild yell as he rushes the group. 

He remembers the shouting in that alley and the dog’s prone body when the gun fires. He remembers Steve’s hiss of pain as one of the kids threw their stick at him just as his left shoulder feels a ripping sensation. 

He remembers Steve yelling as he falls forward. 

As he lays on the snow, he remembers Steve cradling the dog’s body in his bird bone hands, parts of its legs torn from mange and bloody welts, its unseeing eyes and lolling tongue unmoving. 

The men’s boots crunching around him is loud. He feels rough hands grab at him, his vision whiting out in pain as they pull at his left shoulder. He holds on to the memory of Steve cupping the muzzle of the torn up animal, as he feels himself being dragged, this time by the right arm, his entire body seizing as it scrapes against the frigid ground. 

It’s sleeting and the ice beneath him is streaked with blood. 

He closes his eyes. 

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Ok so it’s official: I am now off to the deep end with this fandom. I actually created something holy shit. This was supposed to be a vignette style fic of Bucky remembering/thinking of Steve while he was falling and/or dying in the snow. But no, my brain held me hostage with Atlas Hands by Benjamin Francis Leftwich. It was supposed to be angsty as shit, stevebucky AF. But nooooo I ended up writing over a thousand words of Bucky suffering. Christ. I’m sorry. I suck at romance, love, and/or healthy relationships. In any case, I really am fond of Bucky Barnes alright. But I also like violence so. Anyway if you want to read my shitposts you can find me @bougiebuck in twt.
> 
> Thanks for reading and sorry for all the errors.


End file.
